You want a really weird ride? A science fiction or fantasy epic that stretches your brain like taffy and ties it into strange irregular shapes? Forget television or movies: books are where the really off-kilter stories are told in speculative fiction.

Speculative fiction is the literature of change and discovery. But every now and then, a book comes along that changes the rules of science fiction and fantasy for everybody. Certain great books inspire scores of authors to create something new. Here are 21 of the most influential science fiction and fantasy books.

When I first obsessed about the idea of being a science-fiction writer, I was captivated by the Slipstream movement, which aimed to bust genre boundaries and shatter expectations. And reading about 1975's science fiction boom makes you realize how great the New Wave was. So maybe it's time for a new movement with a…

These days, we're used to seeing articles about how science fiction has gone mainstream, or how the geeks rule the world. But back in 1975, this was still a relatively new idea — and it kind of terrified Newsweek Magazine.

Some of science fiction/fantasy's classic books failed to win over readers at first. And the publishers of some of SF's most beloved works were convinced they had a disaster on their hands. Here are 10 masterpieces that were deemed failures.

Some of science fiction/fantasy's classic books failed to win over readers at first. And the publishers of some of SF's most beloved works were convinced they had a disaster on their hands. Here are 10 masterpieces that were deemed failures.

io9 received a tip that Eric A. Zimmerman, the director of Nine Inch Nails' "Head Like A Hole," is looking to create a film based on Samuel Delany's novel Dhalgren, which is about a Midwestern city trapped inside a singularity.

It's a massive behemoth and possibly the closest thing you could imagine to an unfilmable novel. But starting tomorrow, New York City's The Kitchen is doing a stage play of Samuel R. Delany's challenging Dhalgren. Have they gone mad?